When Bibi the tiny Maltese-shitzu cross was blown off a pier in gale-force winds, his despairing owner Sue Drummond feared the worst.

But salvation came in a most unlikely form - a 20-year-old man who was on Brighton pier to scatter his grandmother's ashes into the bay in Melbourne, Australia.

As he was paying his respects, a quick-thinking Raden Soemawinata spotted a desperate Bibi, and stripped down to his shirt and underpants to dive after the terrified dog. But after the amazing rescue in Melbourne's bayside suburb of Brighton, the hero was humble about his actions.

'It was pretty cold and windy, but it wasn't such a hard decision to jump in, it wasn't such a great feat,' he told Melbourne's Herald Sun. 'I'm a part-time model, so getting into my jocks isn't so different to what I do for work.'

A grateful Ms Drummond embraced Mr Soemawinata with relief after he pushed Bibi into her arms. 'I thought he was going to sink and then maybe I wouldn't be able to find him,' she said. 'But I didn't really want to hop in the water either because I wasn't quite sure if I could make it to shore with a struggling dog.'

Bibi's amazing rescue comes just days after a dog cheated death three times when he twice fell down a 100ft cliff in Dorset and then swam nearly a mile to the safety of a yacht. Buddy the cocker spaniel's first lucky escape happened as he chased a rabbit over the cliff edge, tumbled down the steep rock face and landed in the sea. Unhurt by the fall, he tried to make his way back up the cliff to shocked owner Steve Kingsley only to plunge 30ft back into the water.

Resilient Buddy then changed tactics and started doggy-paddling out to sea. After nearly two hours in the water, the exhausted dog was spotted by a couple in an anchored yacht.Source